Little is known today about the components of woman's orientation toward or adjustment in retirement. The proposed research, utilizing the "flexible case-study" method is designed to: 1. Examine the attitudes toward retirement of older blue- and white-collar women who are approaching the modal age of retirement at the work place; 2. Analyze the retirement experience of older blue- and white-collar women who have been retired two to five years from the work force. Specifically, the study is comparing four groups of women: I. Blue-collar workers (N equals 25); II. White-collar workers (N equals 25); III. Blue-collar retirees (N equals 25); IV. White-collar retirees (N equals 25). Interviews will yield data on each woman's work history, marital status, financial condition, health, expectations for and orientations toward retirement, involvement and satisfaction with work, and, in the case of retirees, experience and adjustment in retirement. In preparation for these interviews, an extensive literature search has been undertaken, and informant interviews with persons responsible for retirement programs have been conducted. The case study approach will employ various techniques of qualitative analysis--e.g., using critical incidents to illustrate more general patterns, selecting cases of greater and lesser impact for description, and suggesting typologies of working and retired women for explanatory analysis. The potential importance of the proposed research is considerable for current policy on the question of retirement, in particular for those who are responsible for setting retirement policy or counselling prospective and actual retirees.